Compare Prices on Celebrity Millennium Asia Cruises

Celebrity Millenmium - What a great let down

The Ships exterior & interior look since the refurbishment:
where the company spent $35 plus million is anyone's guess as it certainly didn't show it

Embarkation & Debarkation & tenders to main lands:
organised well and appeared to work well

Destinations:
The cruise company really does need to leave out Vietnam. The Vietnamese are not geared up for cruise ships, both ports for Saigon and are just container wharfs with no public amenities just buses waiting to take paying passengers on long bus rides to Danang, Saigon and Hanoi. Danang certainly not worth travelling to. The Hanoi bus trip is 3.5 hours each way and on bad roads. Not worth it travel and/or city wise. By the time one arrives its particularly time to the return bus trip back to the ship. Hanoi is bleak and dirty with dust everywhere. I would have hated to have been an asthmatic on either trip. Bangkok - good although again, it a good 1.5 hours trip from the ship into the CBD. Hong Kong - ones More
either loves the place or hates it, personally we enjoy it.

Emergency drill procedures:
the drill carried out by some of the ships staff went well and was well organised

Public rooms:
would have expected more classier styles. Most public rooms lacked any flair (appeared flat)
Public rooms wait staff (bars):
a 15% levy is added onto the price of all drinks at the bars with this 15% going to the wait staff who served one. This is their only income while working on the ship as they don't receive a wage apart from this 15% levy. This practise by the cruise company we found demoralising for the wait staff. Also it makes the passenger uncomfortable if one is just wanting to sit for whatever reason in a bar which also act as a general public room and not buy drinks. All public rooms, except for the library, are general corridors. Drink prices are steep as are bottles of wine. All drink packages are far too expensive and not worth the money, the cruise company must be laughing their way to the banks
General tidiness and ambiance:
all public rooms and areas were always clean & tidy but ambiance missing in most of the public rooms

Stateroom:
very small even with our veranda. Small bathroom. Towels/face clothes, bathrobes etc. had seen better days. Stateroom in general semi clean (dust on the tops of picture frames, wooden beading & both bedside lamps, which also showed a bit a rust on their bases). The bed headboard we found old fashioned & of an unhygienic style. Not nearly enough coat hangers & had to ask for more then our stateroom attendant only gave us a couple so had to ask again for a few more. Curtains of broken hooks & damaged gave a room a shabby look

Celebration Package:
totally screwed up by the company (and possibly on board staff). As part of our package was included a cake on arrival, 2 days earlier than we had asked for, the cake was a Birthday cake when neither of us was celebrating our birthdays. The message which I had asked to be on the Celebration card was totally incorrect. Very, very disappointing!

Room service:
Don't expect the full menu to be listed on the interactive TV because it isn't. To read the full menu for room service try the information book in the stateroom. Room service will take forever to arrive.
Stateroom attendances:
Friendly and always cheerful (pity that these qualities were not display by some other members of the ship)

Main dinning room meals:
Breakfast - a shambles and omelettes pre-cooked causing them to be both rubbery and tasteless
Lunch - acceptable
Dinner - the food was totally acceptable and a good selection on each evening menus

Speciality restaurants: (a cover changes apply to ALL speciality restaurants on board)
Olympic (dined their on 2 occasions) - food was excellent and a beautiful room, could not fault it, and well presented and serviced by knowledgeable wait staff. The only problem that we had with this restaurant was that the wine wait staff were NOT intensive to their duties and on one occasion removed our wine glasses before we had finished our bottle of wine. We had to ask for the glasses back!
Bistro on Five:
a crepes only cafe which was mediocre. The actual style of presentation of the menu is confusing and we had to ask the wait staff how it all worked
Qsine:
a fairly new concept in dining which we both enjoyed. Wait staff were very intensive and helpful in explaining this whole new dining experience
Ocean view Cafe:
this is not a specialty restaurant but the main help oneself meal venue. Badly set out cafe needs redesigning to help passengers more than helping the staff to their work. Most of the foods were very unappealing and a free for all pushy environment.
Most of the food look quiet tired and certainly need a lay down, in the bin!
Ocean view Cafe wait staff:
they work very long hours and most of them had a tired look and few smiled when eye contact was made. Also appears for our experience 'too many chiefs and not enough Indians'. Too eager to clear tables without asking if one has finished
Free coffee at coffees stations around the ship:
The coffee tasted FOUL!! so we keep to tea and water. The free fruit juices from the dispensers next the to coffee machines, was so heavily sweet that we would only fill our glasses with 1/4 juice and top up with water
Casino & staff:
usual run of the mill casino, very American style, LOUD! Staff very grim looking

Theatre:
theatre- decor drab (has artificial flame lamps glowing in recesses around the theatre, looks a tacky and certainly does help when they don't turn them off while talking to us passengers during the emergency drill procedures on fire at sea

Entertainment:
the cruise company needs to pay better to entice more professional performers to grace the theatre stage all very tedious really although giving credit where it is due the permanent dances personnel are good. As for the cruise director, better less said

Customer Services desk:
Helpful but slow in wrapping up each passengers request/questions they could also do with a course of smiling and actually showing their teeth

Excursion desk:
We found only one female staff member cheerful and extremely helpful. In fact one woman who attended to us after we had finished our business with her I had to ask her to smile and not be so gruff & rude with her manner

Ships WIFI:
very expensive not worth the money do you internet at a port of call far cheaper and better internet access and speed

Overall:
Very disappointed with the Millennium, we were expecting a lot more from both the ship & and most of the staff personnel.The cruise company need to have their staff focus more on their attitudes towards the passengers e.g. friendlier, cheerful, smiling engaging. One does have to ask the question, why do some people take on rolls that they certainly do have 'people skills'. Would we recommend this ship to our friends? certainly not! and since we have now experience this company (Celebrity) we do not wish to travel with them again for we believe that there will be a very high chance that other ships, and their staff, will be of the same calibre. I actual asked the Restaurant Manager as to what stars the ship was rated and was informed a 4 star, in his dreams! We would, because of our experiences on this particular ship, rate it between 2.5 and 3 stars and certainly NO higher. Less